St. Mary's Glacier among those in Colorado disappearing during drought

Colorado's hot and dry summer has taken a toll on another popular destination — St. Mary's Glacier.

Typically, you can find a snow patch there year-round, but not right now.

Logan Carney and Jocelyn Johnson flew in from Chicago, and, for many reasons, decided to hike up to St. Mary's Glacier.

"It's on our way to our Airbnb, looked cool online. Figured, we'd give it a shot," Carney told CBS Colorado.

"I have a couple friends who recommended it," Johnson said.

One thing they won't see is the glacier itself because it appears to be gone.

"Wow, holy cow," Carney said.

Thomas Bellinger says that's not surprising to him. He is an adjunct professor at Metro State University of Denver in the Earth and Atmospheric Sciences Department.

"As I understand it, it's dried up quite a bit this year because of the lack of snow and the high temperatures. So it is disappearing, as well as a lot of the other glaciers in Colorado are slowly disappearing," Bellinger said.

Bellinger says the ice field has been there since humans have been in Colorado, but warming climate is threatening St. Mary's Glacier and all the states ice fields and glaciers.

"What's happening too is the internal part of the snowpack is heating up. So that's going to probably accelerate that erosion of the pack," Bellinger said. "The state could lose all of its named glaciers by 2080. It's a problem that's ongoing and a concern. I mean, water supply, recreation, etc."

But missing out on the glacier didn't deter Logan and Jocelyn from hiking. They say there's plenty more to see.

"I think the views," Carney said.

"Yeah, I want to see the lake," Johnson said.

Bellinger says, if we have a few wet winters and temperatures cool, the permanent snowfield may return, but it will take a long time.